Editorial: Where have all the acorns gone?

Team People reports an unusually high number of losses lately for mammals on other teams — in the form of roadkill, to be precise. But people don’t seem to be driving more aggressively or less mindfully. So what’s the explanation?

Acorns! Or rather the dearth of acorns throughout most of Virginia this fall, according to biologists and other scientists who study such things.

Rich in fat, soluble carbohydrates and energy, acorns as a food source have “extensive and complex” impacts on wildlife populations, in the words of Gary Norman, of the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. Numerous factors, including weather, insects and disease, can “influence acorn development from the time of flower initiation to acorn maturity.”

White oaks produce acorns in one growing season, whereas red oaks require two — which makes it tougher to attribute low acorn production by both groups in one season to specific weather events in a single year.

Whatever the cause, the scarcity of this important wildlife food leads to hungry animals ranging far and wide — and across highways — in search of food. Near Roanoke, numerous bears have been struck and killed this fall by motorists, as especially sows with cubs seek to fatten up for winter inactivity. Here in Rappahannock, dead deer, skunks, possums and squirrels are splattered everywhere.

Acorns are one of the state’s most common types of “hard mast,” a term that includes other tree nuts as forest food sources such as hickory and walnut. The scarcity of acorns this fall might have delayed the deer rut according to one hunting expert, because bucks and does have been so lean. Deer are also now more likely to leave forested areas to browse vegetation because without acorns the woods provide little more than cover.

Interestingly, last year was a bumper crop of acorns. And forestry department research has shown that “the inherent cycles between bumper crops and light crops may be an adaptation to allow the trees to restore their resources following a bumper crop.”

Ecosystems encompass exceedingly complex and often incalculable interactions, of course. Everything impacts something else, and any change brings both temporary “winners” and “losers.” For example, acorns are also an important food source for the white-footed mouse, which in turn is an important target in the life cycle of the deer tick. So next summer should see a lower incidence of Lyme disease!

I lmow exactly why there is a shortage of acorns everywhere else…
They are all right here in my yard this year.
I have never seen so many, and such big acorns as this year. My yard is 2 inches deep in the darn things in places. I was blowing leaves this past weekend and it was like trying to blow gravel. WTH? Anybody have any theories why they are so heavy here in Georgia? I suspect it was the wet summer, and cooler than normal temps.
If anybody needs some, bring a shovel and come on.

As soon as Al Gore found out about this he jumped into his private jet, flew to Virginia, and proceeded to hold speeches around college campuses warning the clueless about climate change and encouraged those academics to log onto his website – getcarboncredits.com.

Good, maybe we will see a huge drop off in all the deer and bear in lower NY state and New Jersey. This is a load of crap as well as all the numb-nuts who are running on about GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE and warming. The animal population needs to ebb and flow just like everything else, just like the fall of liberalism around the world.

ACORNs are long extinct; the flying ditto monkeys swooped down amidst some phony Youtube scandal. Now they’ve moved on to voter ID laws, claiming climate change is an obvious hoax because it’s cold out, and decrying the end of Merica that is Obamacare (Revelation 6:66).

On, I see a lot more road kill in NC with our bumper crop of acorns than I do in VA with the supposed drought of acorns. Perhaps you might look at the all of the nice green grass still on the roadsides that the deer so much love to eat…

I find that very hard to believe. I’m a deer hunter in NC, and there are so many acorns this year that both deer and squirrels are tottaly ignoring my piles of corn. I constantly watch them run right past them without even a second glance. The ground is totally covered in acorns. Can VA be so different than NC? I’ve been in VA a lot the last several months. and saw lots of deer. They did not look skinny to me. Every night and morning driving to and from my hotel in Charlottesville, there would be at least 3 deer run in fromt of me. lucky for me, I did not hit any, as I did last year working at the same site. What gives with this article? The reason so many deer are getting hit by cars is there are way to many deer for the habitat and not enough hunters harvesting deer. Do a little more research and get the facts straight.

This happened a few years back in an area from Maine to Maryland. Then, they attributed the acorn shortage to an unusally wet Spring, especially during the two week(?) pollination window which they said impeded the oaks pollination.

I have Chestnut Oak trees on my property in Pa. Over the past 40+ years I noted a great variation in the # of acorns from year to year and presumed it was weather conditions. My daughter who now has her PhD in plant biology informed me while she was attending Duke University there is a theory that the forest oak trees that survived over the eons were those that varied their acorns from year to year. If the output was similar every year the population of animals that relied on them for food would rise and level off to devour all of them and leave none to produce new trees.

Here in northern Delaware, was the largest Acorn drop I ever saw. Last year was barely a mature acorn hitting the ground. It is a cycle. I read somewhere that the trees do this to limit insect infestation. Also, as Todd mentioned, the cicadas may have contributed to the scarcity of acorns in your neck of the woods. We had no such cicada hatch. I collect acorns for Bannock Bread, btw. Next heavy drop, look it up and try it with some home made maple syrup (another story). . .

The decline of wildlife in the Plains States is directly proportional to the lack of moisture (or in other words because of the drought.) Please ask someone who not only lives here but is professionally involved in raising those dastardly GMOs before making such an uneducated, unfounded statement. After all, it really makes sense for me to poison all of the consumers who are buying my product now, doesn’t it? And, it really makes sense for me to endanger the wildlife that I depend on for pollination, rodent control and the like. Please bring me sound data, unbiased studies and competent research to prove your falsehoods before throwing such a defaming and damaging comment out there because I take it personally.

Here there was rain, rain, rain that I think kept the oaks from pollinating as they would in drier years. I suppose the “climate change” believers will want to make something of that. Wrong. I’m not young and I am from a farm family. That is just the way weather is. One year there is too much rain, another not enough. One year it is cool and another is blistering hot. Feast and famine from weather fluctuations have gone on for centuries. Read the Bible. Ancient Egypt under the pharaohs, at Joseph’s direction, planned for a seven year famine—and survived it when it came. Ain’t nothing new under the sun for mankind.

The acorns didn’t grow this year because the 17yr cicadas damaged the oak trees. Actually helps the oak trees in the long run because the cicadas aerate the soil around the tree roots. Rough on the animals this year. But that keeps them in check.

First, I must have ALL the acorns, unless this article relates to Pres. Obama’s Marxist recruitment team.
I am willing to sell some to anyone who needs them.
Second, we can just chalk the loss of these animals as “cost of doing buisiness” like Obama did with the Eagles. The wind farm greenies give it an “Oh Well!”

I travel extensively and have noticed a distinct drop in the number of road kill in most prairie states. I believe the food source has been corrupted by GMO agriculture. Acorns, are another matter, but the article reflects the growing, or shall I say shrinking, problem of the extinction of current wildlife populations across the board.

Here in Pennsylvania, the mast crop is really low as well. Many hunters who manage their land for game animals are finding that their food plots are being overrun by animals because the ‘natural’ areas are not capable of supporting the overpopulated deer herd (and other animals).

This Week’s E-Edition

All news, no paper

For the current week's full Rappahannock News  usually available by 9 p.m. Wednesdays  check out our E-Edition, where you can sign up for your free four-week, no-strings, no-credit-card trial subscription!